Kikuka Sho (Japanese St. Leger) (G1) - Data Analysis

Final leg of the Triple Crown
The first two legs of the Triple Crown (Satsuki Sho [Japanese 2000 Guineas] and Tokyo Yushun [Japanese Derby]) were held in the spring season. With the summer now behind us, the Triple Crown races are about to conclude with the Kikuka Sho (Japanese St. Leger). The runners in this race will battle for the title of Kikuka Sho winner over an unfamiliar distance of 3,000m. This year’s race will be held at Hanshin Racecourse, as was also the case last year. Let’s now analyze the results over the last 10 years.

Runners backed as 10th favorite or lower struggle considerably
Looking at performances by runners over the last 10 years in terms of favoritism, we find that highly favored runners have often secured the victory, with race favorites producing five winners. However, runners backed as 2nd favorite delivered zero winners and achieved a Top 3 ratio of only 20.0%. Shifting our focus to poorly favored runners, we observe that runners backed as 6th-9th favorite produced seven Top 3 finishers. In contrast, only three of the 90 runners backed as 10th favorite or lower finished in the Top 3. In other words, runners backed as 10th favorite or lower are highly unlikely to perform well in this race. [Table 1]

Focus on runners that have contested a graded race last time out
Of the 30 Top 3 finishers over the last 10 years, 15 (half) had contested the Kobe Shimbun Hai (Japanese St. Leger Trial), a trial race for the Kikuka Sho, in their previous race. Meanwhile, seven runners coming from the Asahi Hai St. Lite Kinen (Japanese St. Leger Trial), another trial race for the Kikuka Sho, also entered the Top 3. In other words, the bulk of the Top 3 finishers have historically come from trial races. Conversely, runners coming from 2-win class races have produced five third-place finishers but only one Top 2 finisher. Of the 20 Top 2 finishers, 19 had contested a graded race in their previous race. [Table 2]

Dominance of runners that have finished in the Top 3 of their previous race
Looking at performances by runners over the last 10 years in terms of the finish in their previous race, we note that 26 of the 30 Top 3 finishers had finished in the Top 3 of their previous race. While Titleholder triumphed last year despite having finished 13th in his previous race, runners that had finished 4th or lower in their previous race have struggled considerably over the last 10 years with performance of [1-1-2-75] (Top 3 ratio of 5.1%). This basically suggests that focusing our attention on runners that have finished in the Top 3 of their previous race is the smart strategy. [Table 3]

Focus on record in Classics
Looking at performances by runners over the last 10 years in terms of performance by highest finish in the spring Triple Crown races (Satsuki Sho [Japanese 2000 Guineas] and Tokyo Yushun [Japanese Derby]), we find that runners that had finished in the Top 5 of either of the spring Triple Crown races delivered performance of [6-3-3-22] (Top 3 ratio of 35.3%). In contrast, runners that had finished 6th or lower in those races struggled considerably with performance of [0-3-0-54] (Top 3 ratio of 5.3%). In addition, 15 runners that had not contested the spring Triple Crown races finished in the Top 3. We should therefore favor runners for whom the Kikuka Sho will be their first Classic race of the year, over those that have finished 6th or lower in the spring Triple Crown races. [Table 4]

Seek out the winner!
Check the previous race and favoritism in that race
The six winners since 2016 had all contested a graded race in their previous race and had been backed as 3rd favorite or higher in that race. When predicting the race winner, it may be interesting to choose a runner that matches this profile. [Table 5]

(Michio Kawano)